{"id":405,"date":"2024-07-18T05:28:05","date_gmt":"2024-07-18T12:28:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/?p=405"},"modified":"2024-07-18T05:28:05","modified_gmt":"2024-07-18T12:28:05","slug":"beads-are-out-plaster-is-in-eu25-trench-update-17-7-24","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/2024\/07\/18\/beads-are-out-plaster-is-in-eu25-trench-update-17-7-24\/","title":{"rendered":"Beads are Out, Plaster is In: EU25 Trench Update 17\/7\/24"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Parker Miraldi<\/p>\n\n\n\n

5:30 am. The sun is yet to rise, but between the temperature and the humidity it already feels like 95\u00b0F out. However, despite the air being almost thick enough to drink, we are all eager to get back to digging. Due to the shooting schedule of the British military base the Vigla site sits on our mornings are extremely limited, and we have been pushing hard to finish as much as possible before the end of the season. This time of day is one of my favourites \u2013 the sunrises from up here are stunning, and the excitement is infectious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Sunrise over EU25 before another hard day of digging.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve been working in EU25 with fellow Reedies Emi Clarke and Kayra Lyons and two students from MSU Denver, and although I\u2019m admittedly pretty biased, I do think we have one of the best units on site right now. Or if not the best certainly one of the weirdest! Last week we pulled up over 100 beads \u2013 the most of any unit in Vigla history \u2013 and this week we uncovered an unexplained mound of plaster. Plaster is lighter than rock and easier to break with the hand picks we typically use to excavate, so we have to be very, very careful in order to avoid destroying the shards. The full process took upwards of two days! Thankfully the plaster bits seem to be relatively isolated to just one section of the trench, but the plaster-free areas still have some surprises in store for us.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Primarily, the architecture. Both the walls we\u2019ve uncovered so far shoot off at different angles, creating a series of oddly slanted rooms. Was this intentional, or were the builders just exhausted from the heat and sun? I would understand if they were \u2013 digging with the modern conveniences of sunglasses and snack coolers is hard enough, and I can\u2019t imagine how bad it would have been building these walls without any sort of sun protection! I don\u2019t think delirium can explain the scattering of slabs we\u2019ve been finding though. In addition to the one we uncovered last week we\u2019ve found at least five more, all clustered around the northern wall. All are too large to lift at the moment, and combined with the plaster they make for a very puzzling scene. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Marginally clearer are the small artefacts. I don\u2019t think we\u2019ll know what they were used for until we have a better idea what the structure itself is, but at least we can identify them at first glance. On our first day this week I found a small bronze nail \u2013 it doesn\u2019t look like much, but it\u2019s my first special find of the dig and gives me some strong motivation to keep going! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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My first “special find” – a little bronze nail!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We continued finding chunks of metal slag throughout the week, as well as bits of rock that looked deceivingly like metal but ultimately weren\u2019t. Our trench supervisor Elise is an actual saint for putting up with our endless questions of \u201cis this just a cool rock or something actually significant\u201d! The vast majority turn out to just be cool rocks, but I\u2019ve noticed all of us getting better at discerning between those and other materials throughout the dig. Primarily we\u2019re finding sherds of pottery, but this week also brought a healthy collection of bone fragments and some very pretty shells. And of course, more beads! While they were exciting last week, I think we are all pretty over them now. They are absolutely everywhere across the trench and incredibly easy to miss while digging, so progress in general goes slower for us than some of the other trenches. Despite their frustrating nature though I\u2019m curious what they could have been used for, and I wish we had more context!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Excavations require a lot of tools! This might seem like an excessive amount of buckets, but somehow we always manage to fill them up faster than we can sieve them.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps our answers are coming, and they\u2019re all hidden just beneath the next layer of dirt. I think the mystery and intrigue been my favourite part of excavating so far \u2013 I feel like I\u2019m reading a novel in installments, where the next chapter won\u2019t be published for another week. Sometimes I just want to race ahead to read the last page, but I know our slow pace is important for squeezing as much information out of this site as possible. After all, nobody will ever experience this exact excavation in its original form ever again! Even something as seemingly small as the colour of the dirt or elevation of an artefact could prove essential to unlocking the mysteries of this site, and so we\u2019re taking the time to record it all while it\u2019s still in situ. I feel lucky to be playing a role in this site\u2019s story, and I can\u2019t wait to see how it continues to unfold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Parker Miraldi 5:30 am. The sun is yet to rise, but between the temperature and the humidity it already feels like 95\u00b0F out. However, despite the air being almost thick enough to drink, we are all eager to get back to digging. Due to the shooting schedule of the British military base the Vigla site … Continue reading “Beads are Out, Plaster is In: EU25 Trench Update 17\/7\/24”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1117,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1117"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=405"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":409,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/405\/revisions\/409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.reed.edu\/vigla-archaeological-project\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}